G.R. No.

92573 June 3, 1991

ALEX A. ABILA, petitioner,

vs.
CIVIL SERVICE COMMISSION and FLORENTINA E. ELERIA, respondents.

G.R. No. 92867 June 3, 1991

QUEZON CITY, represented by the Honorable Brigido R. Simon, Jr., petitioner,

vs.
CIVIL SERVICE COMMISSION and FLORENTINA E. ELERIA, respondents.

Z.P. Reyes Law Office for petitioner Abila.

The City Attorney for petitioner Quezon City.
Pedro F. Martinez for private respondent.

RESOLUTION

FELICIANO, J.:

On 1 September 1987, Amado Villafuerte retired from his position as Administrative Officer IV in the
Health Department of the City Government of Quezon City. Then Quezon City Officer-in-Charge
Brigido Simon, Jr. appointed petitioner Alex Abila as Villafuerte's successor. Petitioner Abila who had
theretofore been the Acting Assistant Civil Security Officer, Civil Intelligence and Security
Department of the Quezon City Government, assumed the Administrative Officer IV position on 2
December 1987.

A day earlier, private respondent Florentina Eleria, Administrative Officer III of the Health
Department, Quezon City Government, filed a protest with the Merit System Protection Board
("Board") in respect of Abila's appointment. The Board indorsed the protest to the Quezon City
Officer-in-Charge, Reynaldo Bernardo, who rendered a decision dismissing the protest.

Private respondent Eleria appealed to the Board. On 27 October 1988, the Board promulgated a
decision revoking petitioner Abila's appointment and directing the Quezon City Officer-in-Charge or
Mayor to appoint private respondent Eleria in lieu of petitioner Abila. The Board found that both
petitioner Abila and private respondent Eleria met the minimum eligibility and education
requirements for Administrative Officer IV, but ruled that respondent Eleria had the edge in terms of
rank and experience as an Administrative Officer. The Board also held that respondent Eleria was
holding a position next in rank to that of the vacancy, which circumstance, according to the Board,
under Section 4 of the Civil Service Commission Resolution No. 83-343, gave her "promotional
priority" over petitioner.

Petitioner Abila appealed to the Civil Service Commission ("Commission"). The Commission
affirmed in toto the Board's decision and resolution dated 21 November 1989. Petitioner moved for
reconsideration, without success.
Petitioner is now before this Court on certiorari. He contends that the respondent Commission,
having verified that both petitioner and private respondent were legally qualified to fill the vacancy,
should not have proceeded to comparing the parties' qualifications and choosing the person that it
believed to be the appropriate appointee. Those functions, petitioner urges, belong to the City Mayor
as part of his appointing power and cannot be appropriated for itself by the respondent Commission.

In a Resolution dated 19 April 1990, the Court granted a temporary restraining order enjoining
respondent Commission from implementing its resolutions.

The Quezon City Government, represented by its elected Mayor, Brigido Simon, Jr., filed an identical
Petition with this Court, docketed as G.R. No. 92867, seeking annulment of respondent
Commission's resolution and upholding the validity of the appointment of petitioner Abila on
substantially the same grounds pleaded by the latter.

In a resolution dated 26 July 1990, the Court ordered consolidation of the two (2) cases for their
more convenient disposition.

The recurring issue posed in this case is whether the respondent Commission has authority to
substitute its own judgment for that of the official authorized by law to make an appointment to the
government service, in the matter of weighing an appointee's qualifications and fitness for a position,
after it has been shown that the appointee possesses the minimum qualifications prescribed for the
position.

In a long line of cases,1 the Court has held that respondent Commission has no such authority, the
power of appointment, which is essentially discretionary, being vested by law in the head of the
office concerned. The head of the office is the person on the spot. He occupies the ideal vantage
point from which to identify and designate the individual who can best fill the post and discharge its
functions in the government agency he heads. The choice of an appointee from among those who
possess the required qualifications is a political and administrative decision calling for considerations
of wisdom, convenience, utility and the interests of service which can best be made by the head of
the office concerned, the person most familiar with the organizational structure and environmental
circumstances within which the appointee must function.

In Lapinid vs. Civil Service Commission (supra), the Court through Mr. Justice Cruz, stressed:

We declare once again, and let us hope for the last time, that the Civil Service Commission
has no power of appointment except over its own personnel. Neither does it have the
authority to review the appointments made by other offices except only to ascertain if the
appointee possesses the required qualifications. The determination of who among aspirants
with the minimum statutory qualifications should be preferred belongs to the appointing
authority and not the Civil Service Commission. It cannot disallow an appointment because it
believes another person is better qualified and much less can it direct the appointment of its
own choice.

Appointment is a highly discretionary act that even this Court cannot compel. While the act of
appointment may in proper cases be the subject of mandamus, the selection itself of the
appointee –– taking into account the totality of his qualifications, including those abstract
qualities that define his personality –– is the prerogative of the appointing authority. This is a
matter addressed only to the discretion of the appointing authority. It is a political question
that the Civil Service Commission has no power to review under the Constitution and the
applicable laws.2
The Commission, the Court said in Chang v. Civil Service Commission,3 "is not a co-manager or
surrogate administrator of government offices and agencies."

In the case at bar, the respondent Commission itself acknowledged that both petitioner Abila and
respondent Eleria are legally qualified for the position in question.4 Having made the determination,
the Commission had exhausted its powers and may not act any further except to affirm the validity of
petitioner's appointment. More specifically, the Commission had no authority to revoke petitioner's
appointment because the Commission believed that private respondent Eleria was better qualified
for the position involved; the Commission's acts in this respect constituted an encroachment upon a
discretionary authority vested by law in the Quezon City Mayor and not in the Commission.

The Court notes that a vacant position in the Civil Service may be filled by promotion, transfer of
present employees, reinstatement and re-employment or appointment of outsiders who have the
necessary eligibility.5 The next-in-rank rule invoked by respondent Commission to justify its choice of
respondent Eleria over petitioner Abila, applies only where a vacancy is filled by promotion, a
process which denotes a scalar ascent of an officer to another position higher either in rank or
salary. A promotion involves a situation quite different from the situation in the case at bar where the
appointment of petitioner Abila was effected through lateral transfer from a position in one
department of the city government to a position of greater responsibility in another department of the
same government.6 In Medenilla v. Civil Service Commission,7 the Court very recently stressed that:

. . . We have already held in cases subsequent to Millares that the next-in-rank rule is not
absolute; it only applies in cases of promotion (see Pineda v. Claudio, 28 SCRA 34 [1969]).
And even in promotions, it can be disregarded for sound reasons made known to the next-in-
rank. The appointing authority, under the Civil Service Law, is allowed to fill vacancies by
promotion, transfer of present employees, reinstatement, reemployment, and appointment of
outsiders who have appropriate civil service eligibility, not necessarily in that
order (see Pineda v. Claudio, supra; Luego v. Civil Service Commission, 143 SCRA 327
[1986]). There is no legal fiat that a vacancy must be filled only by promotion; the appointing
authority is given wide discretion to fill a vacancy from among the several alternatives
provided for by law. (Emphasis supplied)

The Court further notes that even if the vacancy here had been filled by promotion rather than by
lateral transfer, the concept of "next in rank" does not import any mandatory or peremptory
requirement that the person next in rank must be appointed to the vacancy. What Section 19 (3) of
P.D. No. 807, the Civil Service Law, provides is that if a vacancy is filled by a promotion, the person
holding the position next in rank thereto "shall be considered for promotion."8

In Taduran v. Civil Service Commission,9 the Court construed that phrase to mean that the person
next in rank "would be among the first to be considered for the vacancy, if qualified.10 In Santiago, Jr.
v. Civil Service Commission,11 the Court elaborated the import of the rule in the following manner:

One who is next-in-rank is entitled to preferential consideration for promotion to the higher
vacancy but it does not necessarily follow that he and no one else can be appointed. The
rule neither grants a vested right to the holder nor imposes a ministerial duty on the
appointing authority to promote such person to the next higher position. . . .12

It appears to the Court that Section 4 of respondent Commission's Resolution No. 83-343 which
provided that:

Rule on Promotion
 xxx xxx xxx

Section 4. An employee who holds a next in rank position who is competent and qualified,
possesses an appropriate civil service eligibility and meets the other conditions for
promotion shall be promoted to the higher position, when it becomes vacant. (Emphasis
supplied)

has been superseded by Section 2 of Rule 3 of the respondent Commission's subsequent

Resolution No. 89-779 which reads as follows:

B. Rules on Protest Cases

xxx xxx xxx

Rule III. Procedure in Filling Vacancies

xxx xxx xxx

Section 2. Positions in the Second Level. — When a vacancy occurs in the second level of
the career service as herein defined, the employees in the department who occupy the next
lower positions in the occupational group under which the vacant position is classified, and in
other functionally related occupational groups, who are competent and qualified and with
appropriate civil service eligibility shall be considered for appointment to the vacancy.
(Emphasis supplied)

When, in the exercise of its rule-making power, it promulgated Section 4 of its earlier Resolution No.
83-343, the Commission clearly exceeded the scope of its statutory authority since the Civil Service
law itself, in Section 19 (3) of P.D. No. 807, had simply provided that persons next in rank who are
qualified "shall be considered for promotion." The current regulation found in Section 2 of Rule III of
the Commission's Resolution No. 89-779 is, fortunately, more consistent with the Commission's
enabling statute.

Finally, respondent Commission will find no comfort in Meram v. Edralin13 which it cites. In that case,
the Court affirmed the appointment of the next in rank "because the original appointee's appointment
was made in consideration of the political, ethnic, religious or blood ties totally against the very
purpose behind the establishment of professionalism in the civil service."14 In the case at bar,
respondents have not asserted the existence of any circumstances, such as those in Meram, which
would have warranted intervention by the Commission to correct an arbitrary and merely capricious
exercise of power by the appointing authority.

ACCORDINGLY, the Court Resolved to TREAT respondents' Comments as their Answers, to

GRANT due course to the Petition for Certiorari and to ANNUL and SET ASIDE the Resolutions of
the respondent Civil Service Commission Nos. 89-869 (21 November 1989) and 90-240 (5 March
1990), respectively. The Temporary Restraining Order dated 19 April 1990 is hereby MADE
PERMANENT.

Fernan, C.J., Narvasa, Melencio-Herrera, Gutierrez, Jr., Cruz, Paras, Gancayco, Padilla, Bidin,
Sarmiento, Griño-Aquino, Medialdea, Regalado and Davide, Jr., JJ., concur.